The house was full of smoke. Franklin called 911 and they all got out of the house safely. Because of Tripp’s early warning, the house was saved, too.

He was honored by the local fire department and later received the Golden Retriever Club of America’s G.R.A.C.E. award, given to rescued goldens with significant and exceptional accomplishments.

“We wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him,” Franklin says.

Relying on other senses
In some cases, animals that have sustained devastating injuries, particularly a loss of vision or hearing, can adapt by relying more heavily on their other senses to guide them. Take Jimmy, for instance, a stray kitten who lost both eyes to infection.

Golub, who took in Cassidy the injured cat, adopted Jimmy last Christmas. "We were trying to find a home for him when Cassidy just fell in love with him, decided that was going to be his kitten," she says. "Cassidy took him under his wing."

Today, Jimmy is thriving. “Unless you look at his face and see that he has no eyes, you really can’t tell that he’s blind,” Golub says. “He uses his other senses and of course he has his whiskers. He goes by feel a lot, but he can navigate the whole house.”

When animals lose their sight early in life, like Jimmy or Little’s one-eyed cat Lily, the brain’s plasticity at that young age helps pets adjust rapidly to their new situation.

“I’ve talked to other people who have blind cats, and we’re convinced there must be another way they can see because they do things that just seem impossible,” Golub says. “I’ll toss a sock toy to him that makes no noise at all and he’ll immediately run toward it and start playing with it. If a cat on the other side of the room gets up, he’ll run right toward that cat to play with it.”

Lily’s eye was removed when she was 5 or 6 weeks old.

“She’s grown up seeing the world through one eye,” Little says. “I’m sure her brain just switched developmental pathways, and she adapted quite quickly. She’s the most acrobatic of all my cats.”

When adult animals lose an eye, their brains aren’t as flexible, but they can still adjust with time. Owners may find that they jump a little less or move more hesitantly, but as long as the furniture stays in the same place, they do quite well.

When Golub tells people about Jimmy, they sometimes ask why she didn’t euthanize him.

“I spent a lot of time thinking about this before we adopted him,” Golub says. “He can do everything he needs without eyesight, and the fact that he can’t see makes absolutely no difference to him.”

Kim Campbell Thornton is an award-winning author who has written many articles and more than a dozen books about dogs and cats. She belongs to the Dog Writers Association of America and is past president of the Cat Writers Association. She shares her home in California with two Cavalier King Charles spaniels and one African ringneck parakeet.

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